Unattainable
by Elphaba01
Summary: Jane Potter was confident and self-assured, having no sense of what was right and what was wrong. Liam Evans was intriguing yet stubborn, and was too strong-minded to take a chance. But then she gave up and he had no intention to go, for she was something he always thought he had, and he was too good for her to love. Genderswap!AU.
1. Prologue: Perhaps

**DISCLAIMER: **I don't own Harry Potter, or make money from this. It is a fanfiction, after all.

Hello! Firstly, I'm sorry for discontinuing Redheaded Prince - to be honest, it really wasn't getting anywhere, and it got me stuck. I kept to my word when I said that I was too busy editing, and that's what I did.

Well, only that I completely rewrote the whole thing with different OCs and style of writing, in a whole different year in a whole different viewpoint(s). So it wasn't really 'Redheaded Prince' anymore, instead becoming more of it's own - and here it is. My 'Unattainable'.

**Warning: **future chapters will have mentions of more darker and sinister subjects, such as **drugs, alcohol, sex, etc**. I did rate it as a T because it's only sort of mild, but ... okay, we'll see.

One more thing: like RP, I enjoy twisting things around and making different interpretations of things, so of course I had fun making the masculine feminine and the feminine masculine, and I thought it would also be an interesting thing to write.

Enjoy.

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><p><em><strong>Prologue - Perhaps<strong>_

- _love looks not with the eyes but with the mind; and therefore is winged Cupid painted blind_ -

When Jane was a little girl, she never saw many eyes. There were often greys and blues and the odd brown next door, but otherwise she was secluded. In a way, she found it frustrating, how she could've seen so many colours and so many emotions and remember so much more eyes than she did in the dawning end that was now.

Perhaps, she mused, as her rugged breath slipped through her cut, bloody lips, that it was what made it precious. Perhaps it had to be that way, to be so far away only to run back twice as fast. Oh, her childhood seemed so distant, and brighter, filled with flowers and wine and stories, so astray from the pointed wands and the cold, and the pain and the choices. It was almost tragic how fast time slipped through her fingertips - but it was probably more so to think how much she wanted to have it back.

Perhaps that was why she loved eyes. Eyes never change - they're immortal, a constant on a person, a reliant on a friend. It was odd how people looked at others in the eye; wasn't it like delving into someone's emotions? Into someone's soul?

Perhaps that was why Jane loved them so much. Because of the emotions. The colours. The immortality. They were a type of immortality that never burdened an individual, Jane thought as she felt her heart slowing, the thumps weakening and weakening - they were a type of undying that didn't kill.

Unless looks could kill.

Looks did kill her several times.

His looks definitely did.

And okay, she didn't know why his eyes were so enticing. She didn't know what emotions his eyes held when he killed her with them and what they meant, and why she felt what she felt when they came, but she had believed that she would never see eyes like his on anyone else for the rest of her life, and that was what was special, and that was what was different.

"I think you have really pretty eyes," she murmured, closing her own emotions and colours from the world. It was a timeless last moment for only her to see, even if it was the last few. "I really, really do."


	2. 1: Matters

**_1: Matters_**

- _a fool thinks himself to be wise, but a wise man knows himself to be a fool_ -

It was probably not one of his brightest ideas, he reflected as he wedged himself between a frog-eyed old woman and an over-emotional man with a business suit, the proximity suffocating. He glared holes into the seat in front of him, his eyebrows crossed in focus for his determined, angry brooding, despite the distracting jiggle of the bus.

The bloke beside him looked like he was desperately trying to cling on to the remains of a relationship, practically crying into the brick that was his phone. "Laura, you know I didn't mean it! Please, let's not talk about it over the phone, I – _no!_ LAURA!"

Liam felt the need to sigh, but couldn't, for the old lady was staring at him with an overly-eager expression that could be classed as slightly perverted - if he so much as breathed, he knew that she would dive into introductions and conversation he had no current urge to participate in.

It was so not one of his brightest ideas - in fact, it was up there with partnering up with Amy Diggory in Potions, and allowing Potter to drag him up the stairs for an intentional trip down a slide in Second Year.

Still, he blamed Petra.

He was in high spirits when his brother had finally been accepting of him earlier that morning (even if it was delayed by six years or so), granting Liam an hour-long lift to King's Cross - okay, so Petra had said near to nothing for the better half of the journey, the dull, monotonous rumble of gravel meeting the rubber tires the only sound that filled the tense silence. But at least Petra was willing to be silent with _him_, and that was what had mattered.

After hesitating for the better part of twenty minutes, Liam had decided to speak. "Radio Two?" Liam offered, casually reaching over to tune the stations. Before his fingers even touched the knob, Petra slapped his hand away.

"Don't touch anything," Petra ordered, sending him a disgusted, hostile look. "I don't want you getting my new car dirty, or something."

Liam resisted sighing. He already did so three thousand times yesterday when his parents thought it smart to have a celebratory farewell dinner for him, all four of them on a table, _together_ - they meant well and all; they just couldn't comprehend the fact that they wanted to punch each other every time they were in each other's presence.

But Liam, ignoring the fact, forced himself to continue talking. "I thought Veronica scratched it?" Veronica was the unbearably average, grumpy, bullying cow that Petra, for some otherworldy, incomprehensible reason, was planning to pop the question at. He bought the ring and everything.

And Liam, having little to no patience of bullies, wanted to shake him and shout at him as loud as possible.

"Yeah, well, that's different."

He felt the corner of his eye twitch with annoyance as he looked at Petra with a surreptitious raise of his eyebrows.

Petra grunted, as if it physically pained him to explain. "She's my girlfriend," he said obviously. "You're... _you_."

"I'm your brother," Liam deadpanned.

Shaking his head, his poofy, dirty blonde perm nearly brushed against Liam's nose, his lips, lined with unhygienic pricks of moustache hair and acne, straightening into a thin line. It was literally as if they were strangers - and Liam felt so goddamn _angry_ all of a sudden at his revelation; now, it wasn't just the fact that he wasn't getting an answer anymore – the avoidance told Liam so much more than that.

That Petra's rage wasn't even good enough for Liam. That Petra only wasn't snapping at him because he wouldn't snap at a common stranger.

A stranger was far too much of a shift for the redhead. Far too much.

He felt angry when he tried to remember them playing football, only to find his previously vivid memories absent, hazy at best. He felt angry when all he was doing was chase and frantically grab hold of the remnants of his shattered relationship with his brother, his supposed confidant he would've confided everything with if things were different. Petra had made Liam feel ungrateful for the life he had, and now he couldn't do it. He just couldn't _what if _anymore.

Bloody hell, he had to give up on his brother.

How fucking messed up was that?

"How did you get Head Boy, anyway?" Petra sneered haughtily, nose turned up at the busy, Central London traffic, and Liam revelled in the image of him strongly resembling a poodle. "I can't imagine how you could ever be trusted with such a responsibility, even in that school."

"I know people that aren't even worth ten times of you in that school. Just because they can accept things doesn't mean you can freely ridicule them for doing so." He narrowed his eyes at Petra. "Is that it? Are you just jealous?"

Petra stayed silent before replying half-heartedly. "No."

Resigning, Liam tugged on his mop of red hair as he sighed. "Bullshit. For God's sake, Petra, grow a pair," he laughed coldly, insensitively, not really caring anymore about what came out of his uncontrollable mouth. "After all these years, you're jealous of something you scarcely believe in - how does that fucking make sense? Can you explain to me how me being Head Boy links to the suggestion that everyone like me is dumb, freaky and stupid? Has it ever occurred to you that all you're ever talking about is yourself?"

He paused, eyeing the sign that signalled the way to King's cross, and the deliberate opposite turn Petra made. Knitting his eyebrows, he glanced behind them and at a now fuming Petra. "You made the wrong turning, King's Cross was just -"

"I know."

_No._ Petra couldn't take away his home. "Petra," he warned, his voice quivering with rage. "Turn around -"

"Shut up!" Petra burst, his voice sounding slightly more feminine than usual. "I'm not t_urning around_, you knobhead! Face it - what's the point of going to a magical boarding school? Nothing!" At this point, he was seething, clutching on to the steering wheel with pale, thin hands. "Wake up from this worthless dream, Liam! Stop being this comical act in a freakshow! Do you know how hard it is to be ashamed of what your little brother has grown to be? Not a f-football player, or-or something, instead to be this... weirdo magician thing! Maybe I'd actually consider us to be actually related if you just stopped this nonsence - in fact, you'd do everyone a favour if you did. Mum cries because of you."

Anger made his heart swell painfully, as if he inhaled Petra's fumes of poisonous bitterness. He felt his neck heat up and the unwelcomed warmth spread across his face. "She _cries_ because of you not able to _accept_ -"

_"- Everything_ you do, you disappoint Mum and Dad, did you know that?" That promptly shut him up, Petra's mention of his parents' opinion of him like a cruel pluck of his heartstrings. Petra laughed darkly at his short, enraged breaths, gleeful at the thought that he had Liam wrapped around his finger (of course, this wasn't the case). "You don't actually think they're _proud_ of you, do you?"

"SHUT UP!"

When he looked back as he stared at the back of the seat in front of him, he realised his temper might've made the situation spiral out of control - it quickly progressed to the point when Liam had to grab hold of the steering wheel himself and pull over (in the middle of London, no less), causing Petra to clumsily pull the Emergency Break.

Traffic clogged up behind them, loud protests and horns beeping, and Petra's wailed for his new, now damaged, car, but… Liam couldn't find it within himself to apologise. "_Fuck you_," he remembered himself spitting at his spluttering, crying brother, getting his trunk and storming off into the alley's shadows to Disapparate to a nearby bus stop he knew.

Of course he felt a strong sort of sorrow when he walked away from his brother. He didn't feel numb like he thought he would when the inevitable happened - instead, it was a mournful resignation, like the feeling people get when they leave a funeral, their backs facing the cemetery; before the death of his brotherhood, Petra had twisted his knife into Liam's already deep wound in that car. It was only about time Liam had thrown the knife away, no matter how memorable and important it may have been. It would've killed him.

"King's Cross," the monotonous call of the driver brought him out of his brooding stupor, his bottle-green eyes lighting up with the fact that his escape was in sight. "Sorry, give us a minute," Liam grunted as he awkwardly manoeuvred around the now snoring old woman, and, after he internally congratulated himself for the success, he speedily walked down the aisle of the bus with added vigour, dragging his simple black suitcase along behind him.

Lifting the suitcase as he stumbled out of the bus, he crossed his eyebrows at the door that barely scraped his arse, looking oddly at the manic bus driver that trilled hysterically at herself and staring at the bright red double-decker that continued down the street.

Polluted, London air greeted him like an old friend, the Autumn breeze caressing his cheeks and brushing through his thick, red locks as he smiled, relieved at the familiarity. He studied his surroundings, comforted at the huge, towering building of the great King's Cross – with the wheels of his suitcase's steady _clicks _skimming over the concrete tiles, he strolled his way towards the entrance with assured, confident strides.

Wading through the swarmed and busy yet spacious hall of King's Cross, he keenly eyed the tall, brick wall between platforms 9 and 10, feeling the heavy weight of his badge in the pocket of his jeans. Despite it being the last and most stressful year at Hogwarts, he was determined for it to be as easy and relaxed as he could possibly make it.

However, he quickly crossed that idea out.

Directly in view, headed straight for Platform 9 ¾, was none other than Jane Potter.

Her dark, messy strands of unattainable, raven hair was thrown into a lazy, low ponytail, bouncing as she swung her hips confidently; the pencil skirt was surely aiding her confident strides, shaping her previously-stick-like figure into one more womanly – summer had certainly treated Potter kindly, Liam confessed, his eyes inevitably drawn into the shape of her body, and the milky skin of her long, smooth legs.

But then his stomach twisted at the thought of her seeing him, and a scenario played out in his mind – she would spot him in the middle of the crowd, his hair giving it away, and her bright, hazel eyes would widen; she would gather a breath, a breath that would signal for him to cover his ears, and her loud wailing cry, "MY DEAR EVANS!" would echo across the station.

An embarrassing event daunted over him, teasing.

Biting his lip, his emerald eyes searched worriedly for places to cover, glancing at the time – 10:30 – dammit, all the good carriages would've gone, none of his mates would've been early – he could always start his prefect rounds early, prepare for trouble before trouble even came aboard – but that was a bit too organized, even for him – for God's sake, there was nowhere to go – he was right in the open – no, she was turning around – she saw him –

The first thing he noticed was her unsmiling lips, and the darkness of her hazel hues, and the tears that rimmed around them, and at first he was confused, for Jane Potter was never upset and Liam Evans was never at a loss of what to do, but she went through the wall before he could ask what was happening.

* * *

><p>The first thing he heard was Marcus McKinnon's low hum blending harmoniously with the songs of voices when Liam slipped into their crammed compartment, seeing him smiling contently as his blue eyes twinkled with a sort of tranquillity Liam didn't see in anyone else. "Yeah, but Pink Floyd – they're great. I only just caught up with them – they've been going for what, ten years?" he asked Dylan rhetorically who sat across from him, plucking the guitar strings distractedly. "Dunno why I never heard of them before the summer." Fidgeting with his suitcase, Liam raised a hand in greeting. "Oi, Liam – what d'you think of Pink Floyd?"<p>

"They're alright," he said nonchalantly, slipping his wand out from his pocket and casting a hovering charm on his suitcase; he teasingly swung it onto the shelf above Giddy, just about scraping the air around her, who dramatically shrieked at the close contact, and he laughed as he continued, "_Animals_ was brilliant."

"I _did _mention _Animals_ before," Giddy said indignantly, shooting Liam a scathing glare before pointing at Marcus self-righteously. (To be honest, Giddy never said anything about Pink Floyd, being quite uninformed about all that was remotely Muggle. Liam wondered who, with a curious and amused quirk of his eyebrow, she was trying to impress.) "You were just too drunk to listen!"

"Maybe you were too tipsy to mention it?" Marcus suggested, grinning. Dylan strummed his guitar climatically, causing Liam to roll his eyes good-naturedly and Eli Vance, a strong silent type, snorting to hide a laugh.

She raised her eyebrows, scoffing. "Maybe you're a prat?"

"This… is escalating quickly," Eli commented slowly, smirking, olive eyes light with amusement.

"Ooo!" Dylan said, mocking a ghost, and Liam suddenly thought he strongly resembled Shaggy from _Scooby Doo. _"What're we going to do? Sexual tension for a McKinnon and a Prewett mustn't be good!"

"And it also mustn't be good for a stoner to still smoke a fag in a compartment where teachers can see us," Giddy deadpanned, gesturing at the packets of cigarettes that was hastily thrown in a shopping bag at his feet. Frowning, her nose wrinkled in disgust. "Merlin, don't tell me you have your lunch in there, too..."

"Well –"

Giddy made a gagging noise. "Eugh, _gross_."

"Mate, put that in your trunk so I can't see it," Liam sighed, wincing at the stench of tobacco/weed/any-type-of-drugs that wafted as Dylan whirled around and jammed the packets in the front pocket of his trunk. "Jesus, I'm _Head Boy_."

"Aw, fuck, yeah!" the smoking guitarist moaned theatrically in remembrance at Liam's stressed phone call – thank God the Meadowes were a half-blood family – slapping his forehead. He was a bit too forgetful for a Ravenclaw. "Seriously, Evans? I thought prefect was enough for you!"

To be honest with himself, Liam wasn't really going to dob his friend in; Dylan had always been a dangerous friend to be around, certainly not a guy you would look up to, but that was who he was. A good bloke with good intentions – just, perhaps, not the best way of going around things, like the time in First Year when he thought it to be a brilliant idea to throw parchment at the back of Seventh Year Slytherin, Lucia Malfoy, for calling Liam a Mudblood, or when he offered his fancy his bed in the first conversation they shared.

He thought common diplomacy would've worked just as well on both occassions.

Despite contrary belief, Liam Evans was actually not a haughty goody-two-shoes. He was more like a stiff blade of grass that was hard to sway.

"Sorry," Liam said in the most unapologetic tone he could manage. (He could still be a cruel Head Boy, or, to be more exact, a cruel friend.) "So, how was everyone's holidays?"

"It was alright," said Eli modestly.

"Perry's turned one," Gwen said. "Anna Weasley is _actually _a good mum now." (Before the summer, Giddy had her doubts about the Weasley. Liam thought it ridiculous.) "... and my sister is becoming an antisocial brat. It was great!"

"Me and Marcus got shit-faced," Dylan laughed goofily at Marcus's more-than-unimpressed expression on his face; the wizards were both dodgy and prone to danger - they just had different ways of showing it. For instance, Marcus was practically an alcoholic, parading into Hogsmeade for his amounts of Firewhiskey every week or so, but he just never showed off about it. However, Dylan saw it as something to be proud of.

"That was before I went to France with the Potters," Marcus corrected, referring to the annual holiday he went to with his four sisters and his neighbours. Liam felt oddly uncomfortable at the mention of the girl that cried on his way to Platform 9 ¾. "It was alright – not as good as usual, but that was to be expected."

Liam knitted his eyebrows. "Why?"

"Can't really say," said Marcus, wincing at a memory. "It took a lot of shots for Jane to cheer up."

Shots?

"Looks fit now, though," Dylan thought shallowly. Liam didn't even realise he was glaring. "What? Alright, just because you don't think so, doesn't mean –"

"Dylan, shut up," Giddy snapped disdainfully, not ever being a good fan of his. "Do you have no tact?"

* * *

><p>Hogwarts's students were a bit more restless than usual, Liam reflected as he stared at the collection of things that was stuffed in his straw-thatched bag labelled 'STUFF – PREFECTS USE ONLY', a bag that he and Rhea craftily concocted in Fifth Year for collecting unauthorised items; so far it was packed, with (thankfully) defused dungbombs, lighters (Dylan's doing), illegal weight-loss and love potions, actual, <em>real-life<em> frogs that were coated in brown paint/mud (harshly imprisoned in a chocolate frog packet) and a few sticks First Years were maturely stabbing each other with.

But, as usual with such things, Liam felt achieved and authoritative – he knew he wasn't the best man for the job, being an unproductive, argumentative, redheaded, Mudblood procrastinator, however much he acted like he was. Despite this, he did give himself enough slack to feel proud, allowing his fingers to fiddle with his bright red badge and his lips to upturn slightly into a smile.

He was the first unproductive, argumentative, redheaded Mudblood procrastinator to be bestowed the title Head Boy, and that was what mattered to him.

With a cautious step over the joint that connected the carriages together, he entered the next hallway – "-you fucking bitch, you're _nothing-_" – and almost immediately, his wand was drawn, his eyebrows were crossed, the bag was dropped and a spell was cast, the knife clattering on to the floor before the Slytherin joined it, the hard _thunk _of his body reverberating the floorboards beneath Liam's feet.

Oh, he was furious, no matter whom the victim was – _God_, if there was one person he would kill – and his emerald eyes darkened as they looked away from an unconscious Narcis Black, instead focusing on a breathless Jane Potter, a marked line clear on her milky throat, and his fists clenched tighter. "What did he do to you?"

Her cheeks flushed. "I could've handled it myself!" she protested.

"Yeah, I saw you handled the situation just fine!" Liam snapped, his wand still trained the Black and glaring venomously at her. "Jesus Christ – did he come up to you?"

"Yes. I mean, no," she stuttered. (Jane Potter never stuttered.) "Listen, there was matters I had to take care of –"

"Matters? What matters?"

"Can you keep your bloody nose out of my business?"

"Business? Potter, he just held a _knife_ at your throat -"

"Jane."

He halted in his raging splutters, taking a deep breath as he looked at her strangely. (A look he unknowingly gave her a lot.) "What?"

"My name is Jane," she said quietly, strictly, her voice a brewing, bubbling potion just expecting the inevitable wrong ingredient. "Stop involving yourself with something you can't understand." With a last tired glare, shook her head, her tumbles of jet-black curls swaying from side to side, before simply walking back the way he came, her shoulder clashing hard into his. She didn't look back when she said, emotionless, "See you in the meeting."

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><p>Reviews make me smile.<p> 


	3. 2: Of Sighs and Patience

_"My name is Jane," she said quietly, strictly, her voice a brewing, bubbling potion just expecting the inevitable wrong ingredient. "Stop involving yourself with something you can't understand." With a last tired glare, shook her head, her tumbles of jet-black curls swaying from side to side, before simply walking back the way he came, her shoulder clashing hard into his. She didn't look back when she said, emotionless, "See you in the meeting."_

* * *

><p><strong>2: Of Sighs and Patience<strong>

_- love is a smoke raised with the fume of sighs -  
><em>

Liam was still confused, much to his deep and utter shame, and was still at a loss for what to do. Guilt and the absence of clarity kept on growing until it was a cloud of misconception, or a misty whirl of some sort of strange. And God, did Liam despise it, being lost and stumbling, and knowing that his efforts to cease the feeling would only end in defeat. Everywhere he was, it lingered in the air.

It started when he learnt that Jane Potter was Head Girl.

"You're Head Girl?" he asked, feeling too aggravated to even notice the seeping cold that wafted through the hallway and instead to be annoyingly puzzled at how her badge reflected the light, and how she was casually leaning against the wall, and how she hardly noticed him, and how relaxed she was, especially before an all-important meeting with Dumbledore. "Why didn't you tell me before?"

She glanced up at him, raising an eyebrow that was both criticising and amused before resuming in her scribbling. "I was a bit preoccupied, Liam."

The knife glistened blindingly in the back of his mind, and he was so momentarily dazed that he almost forgot to reply. "Well, yeah, I know that, but - I'm sorry, but... _you_?"

"What about _me_?" she said.

"Look at us!" he burst, gesturing at the space between them and thought the succinct explanation was enough to explain all his concerns. "There's a bit of a contrast, isn't there? It doesn't make-"

Jane interrupted him with a shift in her stance and a silencing point of her finger, tugging on the ends of her hair with her other hand. He noticed how capable her hands looked - olive, smooth yet calloused and experienced, unpainted, worn nails on long, skillful fingers that were made for fiddling and making things - but she quickly brought him back to the situation at hand. "Okay," she said after a while, as if it was a huge rock to swallow. "Alright, continue."

He knitted his eyebrows and rubbed the back of his neck as he continued, "There must be some sort of mistake, Potter," he said quickly, because Potter and Evans did _not _work well together - the two of them did not add up to a... well, a profitable sum, and the whole of Hogwarts must've _known _that, especially Dumbledore, who witnessed every annual Valentines shouting match to count. "I'll talk to Dumbledore when she lets us in and we'll get you back to your, uh, dorm - Giddy can help you unpack-"

"Are you fucking with me, Evans?"

He looked at her strangely, stumped at the hardness of her eyes and her lips curling into a severe line, holding Hell in her mouth. "What?" said Liam. "Why would I-"

Suddenly, she shot up from her slumped posture, hastily fumbling with the pockets of her skirt with shaky hands and the jittery tone of her voice. "Yes, you are, Evans!" she said hotly. "Because I got _just _the same as you did. See?" She pulled out a folded piece of parchment, her hands hastily unfolding it to reveal a crumpled letter, slapping it into his hands with her eyebrows crossed. "Read it, go on!"

**_Dear Miss Potter,_**

**_I am pleased to inform you that you have been chosen for the prestigious position of Head Girl, a role in which you will be not only a role model and representative, but also a supportive confidant for all of the talented students at Hogwarts. _**

**_Enclosed in this letter is the badge you may wear with pride - you have earnt it!_**

**_Should you accept the position, meet me outside _****_my office after the Sorting and Welcoming Feast with the Head Boy for a brief meeting concerning responsibilities, rules and regulations at 7 o'clock sharp, and please don't be late - the gargoyles are becoming a wee bit impatient!_**

**_Oh, and Jane - know that I believe in you._**

**_Yours sincerely,_**

**_Prof. Alana Padma Winifred Belinda Dumbledore_**

**_(Order of Merlin, First Class, Grand Sorc., Chf. Warlock, Supreme Mugwump, International Confed. of Witches)_**

He furrowed his eyebrows, handing back the letter as he strode across the hall to stand opposite the enigmatic witch, wiping his eyelids warily and preparing himself for another infinite argument - except this time, it wasn't about Liam not giving in to Potter's "charms" and "positively fine" looks, but about something less petty and important; except this time, she was angry with him, too.

This was not the Potter he had known before the summer, and, for a beat of a moment, he was concerned, a bit saddened for the playful, admittedly funny girl that pranked and danced along the halls, but it was gone before it began to show. "Listen, Potter," he started, with a lack of emotion that he would've otherwise cringed at, "this isn't going to work. Hell, I can't _stand _you."

"Nor can I," she said with no hesitation, marching over to him and crossing her arms, "but I'm stuck with me. Have been for several years, actually," she added.

"Did you just hear what I said? I can't _stand_ _you_."

"Yeah, well, you're stuck with me, too. We can support each other in this great time of need," she said sarcastically, throwing her hands dramatically in the air, the warmly-lit lanterns casting shadows across her scowling face. "In history books, it'll be called _The Great Bearing of Jane Dorea Potter_ and many witches and wizards will learn in boring History of Magic lessons of the tale in which we both heroically survived the year!"

His face transformed into one with suppressed irritancy, his eyebrows crossing sternly and his stance shifting to tower (only slightly; Potter was taller than most girls) over the fuming witch, his reddening face only inches away from hers. "This is serious," he said, because it bloody well _was_. When (or if) he had come to terms with the fact that she was deserving of the position, he still had the fact that she was difficult and argumentative and a self-centered bitch.

Unfortunately, that side of her didn't change.

Yet, she stared up at him as if he was the most otherwordly being on this earth, her doe-like eyes squinted critically before she sighed tiredly. "Is everything serious to you?"

(Says she who can't tell the difference between a comedy show and a funeral. But he didn't give her the satisfaction in saying that.)

* * *

><p>"Calm down, Liam," Giddy muttered to him when she saw his muscles tensing, hunching over his beans on toast in a half-heartedly secretive way. "You've been such a git to her, you should've seen it coming."<p>

"How?" he snapped, furrowing his eyebrows in annoyance. Yes, he had slip-ups with his temper, but he had always apologised for those times where it went disproportionately wrong – everything else she bloody well deserved.

Disorientating emotions was on its high last night. Standing outside that hallway, he was frustrated by how she was adamantly ignoring him, and how, during every second she was in his presence, fueled his annoyance. Throwing nasty looks and heaving out long, loud sighs didn't seem to be enough to draw her attention, which was odd, if he thought about it; he always despised her attention, always hated her smitten looks and cheeky innuendos and the stalling chats in between lessons, and he especially hated the line, _Oi, Evans, can I have a word?_

It was more than a word, it was more like a bloody sonnet.

But there _was _the meeting, and he couldn't fault her for that.

Liam hesitated before telling Giddy, the words feeling odd in his mouth. "Okay, look - I'm not trying to be a little shite about all of this," he explained earnestly, his focus flickering between a solemn Giddy and a half-listening, half-critical Marcus from across the table. "Dumbledore herself told her she deserves this, and I'll trust her judgement, even if it is Potter."

_Even it is a changed, respectful, responsible and not-Potter Potter._

Marcus raised an eyebrow. "If she deserves it, what's the problem?"

Sighing, Liam put down his knife and fork and ran his fingers along his jawline thoughtfully, an overused, stressful habit. "Deserving and wanting are completely different things, and it's _Potter_, Marcus. Why would she want to be Head Girl?" Liam said, pouring some pumpkin juice into his goblet whilst shaking his head confusedly. "It doesn't make sense. Sh-she's immature, and-"

"And so are you," said Marcus frankly from across the table. "You avoid her, she avoids you. Let it be that way until you sort your shit out." He slipped off his mountain of oatmeal off his spoon, not noticing the attention he was getting from the opposite gender down the table and the threatening glare Giddy sent them. (Apparently his lips did 'wonderful things'.) "Don't let your temper get to you."

"I'm not letting my temper get to me."

"_I'm not letting my temper get to me_," echoed Dylan, who oh-so-coincidentally took a detour around the Hufflepuff table and was breezing past on that precise moment, with a curious Eli stumbling behind him. "Having a hissy fit, are we?" The Ravenclaw laughed teasingly, and Liam thought, with a slight tightening of his jaw, that he would much rather be in Azkaban if it meant for Dylan to stop talking. "No _wonder_ you're a Gryffindor! What's he on about now?"

Marcus rolled his eyes grouchily, never being a morning person even on the best of days, scooting over slightly in order for the two Ravenclaws to sit. "He's having an existential crisis about Jane avoiding him."

"And I'll say it again – no _wonder_ you're a Gryffindor!"

Giddy squirmed in her seat, loosing her patience as she dropped her spoon into her bowl, wads of porridge landing across the table and in Marcus's mop of hair, who gave Giddy an ignored scathing scowl. "Do you have _any _emotional empathy for your best friend? Any at all?" she prodded determinedly.

"No, cos he's fucking stupid."

"No, cos he's a Gryffindor."

"So if I was crying in front of you, Dylan," said Giddy, hostile, leaning dangerously across the table, "would you feel empathetic towards me?"

Immediately, his eyes drifted downwards, before travelling back up into her eyes with a wink. "Well, yeah. I'd hug you and kiss you until you feel better, honey. Nice pink bra."

At that comment, Giddy leaned away in disgust, shaking her head and pushing her dish away from her. "I'm done," she declared, in resignation. "I'm done! Liam, I'll sneakily talk to her mates for you - I sit next to them in Muggle Studies - because I know that's what you want even if you won't admit it-"

Where was the logic in _that_ conclusion? "Excuse me?" Liam spluttered.

"Don't make me explain, Liam," she said airily, holding her palm up to him as a sort of reflective shield as she stood. She forced out a tone of light happiness that somehow was more scary than her stern shouting. "I am officially done with Dylan Meadowes! Good day to you all!"

At least Giddy was patient.

* * *

><p>Marcus McKinnon was far to occupied in revelling in the indulgent evening breeze and the warmly lit lanterns on the street and the glinting seas of puddles that were locked in cobbled streets and the soft brush of a drop of rain to realise that someone was following him.<p>

He liked to think that he was a straight-forward, intelligent and composed sort of wizard, who had the common sense to know right from wrong and had a general idea in what to do in these types of situations. However, Marcus remembered a lot of things and a lot of situations - defensive spells (useful), exotic European words, the beat of hearts, the shape of lips, the sweet taste of home, and, on this occassion, the light tap of Saiph Black's footsteps.

there was a slight difference between a Slytherin and a Gryffindor, and he supposed that confronting the most attractive witch in the school with high hopes was one of them.

Turning into a cramped alleyway, he halted and waited for her to catch up to him as he twiddled his wand in between his fingers - it _was _Saiph, after all, he had to be wary - and, with a knowing smile, called out to the silhouette of a tall, slim, curvy goddess. "Following me?"

As soon as she was close enough for him to see her, she feigned a confused look and whirled her head around to look around her. "Me?" she mocked, before barking out a laugh and moving further down the alley. She was wearing her signature leather jacket and hazardously reckless, wide grin. "Yeah, I followed you - I don't usually see you here at this time in the morning, McKinnon. Are you quite alright?"

"I'm fine, yeah," he said, as casually as he could when Saiph was around. (They always needed a few shots before he could relax.) "What brings you here?"

Wrapping her arms around herself, she smiled up at him - a smile she didn't give anyone else. "You know the usual. Business," she answered, her grey eyes studying him carefully, just like she always did. "Bit well dressed, aren't you?"

"Looks alright, doesn't it?" he defended himself reflectively, looking down at himself with knitted eyebrows; forgetting that he forgot to (a) iron it and (b) tuck it into his jeans, he thought he looked okay in his plain blue polo shirt, especially because his mop of light brown hair was actually _combed _for once.

On the other side of the spectrum, she had dirty, worn black tights beneath carelessly cut denim shorts and a smudged dirt mark smeared across her cheek - she was some sort of haphazard - and he noticed her previously long and devilishly alluring strands of dark hair were now sheared off, rebelliously short and choppy.

He decided it was better not to mention any compliments. She was too vain as it was already.

"It's not _you_, though," she said, stepping forward so that he could smell the scent of cigarettes and flowery perfume and feel her breath dancing along his shirt and slipping through to his chest. Raising her height with her tip-toes, she loosened a few suffocating buttons around his neck and messed up his hair with the tip of her fingers, a slight release of satisfied air puffing out of her mouth as she stepped back down. "There," she sighed, pleased. Saiph looked up at him with her wild grin, and admittedly, he couldn't find it within himself to genuinely scathe her for messing up his devine efforts to look presentable. "Better?"

"No," he muttered bluntly, but followed her through the darkly lit alleyway and towards the back entry of Hog's Head anyway. Her hand slipped into his own, more of a leading way than anything else, but Marcus still quietly relished in the delicacy of her knobbly fingers locked between his own artsy ones, and the warmth that spread into his palm and up his arm, even if she didn't seem to notice in her determined three knocks of the door of Hog's Head.

"You look much more attractive with a rugged, drunken sort of appearance," she said off-handedly. "Much more sexy that way, you know? Don't shave and get that stubble growing, and _then _you'll be thanking me. Seriously, you've learnt from the best. _Take that look of your face_," she sang dramatically, pointing at his previously scowling face, and he laughed despite him not knowing at all what she was on about. Muggle TV, probably. "Andrew Lloyd Webber, that is. You should listen to it."

Oh, but sometimes she was just too odd for him to properly comprehend, and she gave him a bloody headache. "Pink Floyd's more up my street," he said, giving her a strange look. "Wait, Dylan hasn't given you anything, has he?"

She snorted. "Who do you take me for?" she said. "He's an alright bloke, but he just charges too much for his shite. Where does he even _get_ them from?"

To be honest, to Marcus, Dylan Meadowes was just a happy-go-lucky, annoying prick that could never wholesomely be sober - which was, the more he thought about it, sounded a lot more like him than it did the Ravenclaw. The only use for him was to get him shit-faced, which, at the time, he was grateful for - he definately wasn't the morning after.

Either way, Marcus was too busy not to punch the git than to think deeper and to think _why _and _how _and _when _and _where_.

Before he could reply with a simple 'dunno', the wooden door, comprised of cracks, sticking charms and a moldy, silver knob, creaked open hesitantly, the welcoming host suspiciously (but not unusually) absent. With a glance and a uncaring shrug, Saiph entered the gloomy hallway, fearless and undoubtedly self-assured - and Marcus, having an uncannily instantaneous trust in her, followed her with the blossoming feeling of confidence.

* * *

><p><strong>AN:**

Yeah, I'm not very impressed with myself on this chapter; I've rewritten it a dozen times but I still can't crack it. It'll take a millenia before I do, so... yeah, I'm giving you your Chapter Two! :P

To those who have reviewed, favourited/followed this story - thank you! I'm happy to hear your opinions on this, since it's such a weird fic to write, genderswapped and all - especially weird to write a fem!Dumbledore. Any opinions on the characters?

In case you're wondering, Saiph is a part of the constellation Orion, and is pronounced 'safe'. At least we still got the homophone thing going on with the fem!Sirius.


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